Extra Services

Dog Seller Had No Malicious Intent

Date Posted: 2000-12-15

In response to the letter “ Beware of This Unscrupulous Dog Seller,” the readers of the highly respected Japan Update need to know the FULL story and not a bunch of half-truths. About the only accurate part of the letter was the fact that when the dog was delivered there was what looked like a skin rash on the dog’s ear. At that very point the buyer should have immediately not accepted a less than perfect product. It did turn out to be mange, but here is what was not told to you. Of the other puppies in the litter, one other had a lesser case of mange, but the rest of the litter was perfectly healthy.

Mange is a natural occurrence in dogs that may contract the mites. Even though the buyer did accept the dog, she still had a 2-week option to return the dog and get a full refund. The “rash” had spread and was diagnosed as mange, but the buyer did not address this with the seller until nearly 2 months had elapsed. What she wanted, believe it or not, was a full refund of her money AND to keep the dog. By the way the disease was completely controllable, treatable and has since been cured. The seller offered to pay all medical costs, which was extremely admirable since the buyer already breached the contract by not returning a dog with a known condition within the 2 weeks and failed to make the final payment. The seller has been doing this business for 1 ˝ years and out of the hundreds of puppies sold there have been a few cases where puppy was diagnosed with a condition but the buyers and seller came to compromises of either returning the dog, discounting the price, or compensation for medical treatment. There have only been a few cases but for the most part they were easily resolved.

Now for the rest of the story. The exaggeration of not returning phone calls is false. There was a dialogue between the buyer and seller until the buyer breached the contract and started harassing the seller. After a little bit of intervention, the situation seemed to calm down. Then the conspiracy occurred. The seller received a phone call from what seemed to be an interested party to buy a puppy. They had agreed to meet on Kadena and the female party asked to hold the dog and show it to a friend. At that point she passed the dog to 2 males that were staying out of sight and one of the parties took the paperwork from the seller and they got into a car and drove off. Basically, they dognapped the puppy. Fortunately, the daughter of the seller was along for the ride and remembered the license plate, so the seller went to the Security Forces and reported the crime.

To make a long story short, the guilty parties are being processed for their crimes. It is a sign of very unstable people to go through those extremes to exact revenge when it could have been resolved immediately. Under the cover of “once I saw those big, brown eyes, I was done” is no excuse. It is still a business and the buyer is responsible to make a rational decision and should not accept anything less than perfect. It is unfortunate that the puppy had the mange, but as you read before, it has been cured and the buyer still owes the money to the seller…money which the seller was willing to forgo, but since the set-up and theft has felt it is not deserved.

I am not asking anyone to make judgments and I know that everyone has their own opinion. The intentions of the seller were and always have been honorable. There has been overwhelming positive feedback from hundreds of extremely satisfied customers. The only malicious intent came from the buyer and associated parties.